Publications
Dive into our publications and explore the science from the Environmental Health Program (Toxic Substances Hydrology and Contaminant Biology).
Filter Total Items: 4094
Borehole radar interferometry revisited
Single-hole, multi-offset borehole-radar reflection (SHMOR) is an effective technique for fracture detection. However, commercial radar system limitations hinder the acquisition of multi-offset reflection data in a single borehole. Transforming cross-hole transmission mode radar data to virtual single-hole, multi-offset reflection data using a wave interferometric virtual source (WIVS) approach ha
Authors
Lanbo Liu, Chunguang Ma, John W. Lane, Peter K. Joesten
Identifying non-point sources of endocrine active compounds and their biological impacts in freshwater lakes
Contaminants of emerging concern, particularly endocrine active compounds (EACs), have been identified as a threat to aquatic wildlife. However, little is known about the impact of EACs on lakes through groundwater from onsite wastewater treatment systems (OWTS). This study aims to identify specific contributions of OWTS to Sullivan Lake, Minnesota, USA. Lake hydrology, water chemistry, caged blue
Authors
Beth H. Baker, Dalma Martinovic-Weigelt, Mark L. Ferrey, Larry B. Barber, Jeffrey H. Writer, Donald O. Rosenberry, Richard L. Kiesling, James R. Lundy, Heiko L. Schoenfuss
Transcriptomic effects-based monitoring for endocrine active chemicals: Assessing relative contribution of treated wastewater to downstream pollution
The present study investigated whether a combination of targeted analytical chemistry information with unsupervised, data-rich biological methodology (i.e., transcriptomics) could be utilized to evaluate relative contributions of wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) effluents to biological effects. The effects of WWTP effluents on fish exposed to ambient, receiving waters were studied at three locati
Authors
Dalma Martinovic-Weigelt, Alvine C. Mehinto, Gerald T. Ankley, Nancy D. Denslow, Larry B. Barber, Kathy Lee, Ryan J. King, Heiko L. Schoenfuss, Anthony L. Schroeder, Daniel L. Villeneuve
Spatial distribution of mercury in southeastern Alaskan streams influenced by glaciers, wetlands, and salmon
Southeastern Alaska is a remote coastal-maritime ecosystem that is experiencing increased deposition of mercury (Hg) as well as rapid glacier loss. Here we present the results of the first reported survey of total and methyl Hg (MeHg) concentrations in regional streams and biota. Overall, streams draining large wetland areas had higher Hg concentrations in water, mayflies, and juvenile salmon than
Authors
Sonia A. Nagorski, Daniel R. Engstrom, John P. Hudson, David P. Krabbenhoft, Eran Hood, John F. DeWild, George R. Aiken
The planning process
No abstract available.
Authors
Carol C. Russell, Kathleen S. Smith, Virginia T. McLemore
The environmental geochemistry of Arsenic – An overview
Arsenic is one of the most prevalent toxic elements in the environment. The toxicity, mobility, and fate of arsenic in the environment are determined by a complex series of controls dependent on mineralogy, chemical speciation, and biological processes. The element was first described by Theophrastus in 300 B.C. and named arsenikon (also arrhenicon; Caley and Richards 1956) referring to its “poten
Authors
Robert J. Bowell, Charles N. Alpers, Heather E. Jamieson, D. Kirk Nordstrom, Juraj Majzlan
Arsenic speciation and sorption in natural environments
Aqueous arsenic speciation, or the chemical forms in which arsenic exists in water, is a challenging, interesting, and complicated aspect of environmental arsenic geochemistry. Arsenic has the ability to form a wide range of chemical bonds with carbon, oxygen, hydrogen, and sulfur, resulting in a large variety of compounds that exhibit a host of chemical and biochemical properties. Besides the int
Authors
Kate M. Campbell, D. Kirk Nordstrom
Contaminants of legacy and emerging concern in largescale suckers (Catostomus macrocheilus) and the foodweb in the lower Columbia River, Oregon and Washington, USA
We investigated occurrence, transport pathways, and effects of polybrominated diphenyl ether (PBDE) flame retardants and other endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs) in aquatic media and the foodweb in the lower Columbia River. In 2009 and 2010, foodweb sampling at three sites along a gradient of contaminant exposure near Skamania (Washington), Columbia City (Oregon) and Longview (Washington) inclu
Authors
Elena B. Nilsen, Steven D. Zaugg, David A. Alvarez, Jennifer L. Morace, Ian R. Waite, Timothy D. Counihan, Jill M. Hardiman, Leticia Torres, Reynaldo Patiño, Matthew G. Mesa, Robert Grove
Nitrogen cycling processes and microbial community composition in bed sediments in the Yukon River at Pilot Station
Information on the contribution of nitrogen (N)-cycling processes in bed sediments to river nutrient fluxes in large northern latitude river systems is limited. This study examined the relationship between N-cycling processes in bed sediments and N speciation and loading in the Yukon River near its mouth at the Bering Sea. We conducted laboratory bioassays to measure N-cycling processes in sedimen
Authors
Deborah A. Repert, Jennifer C. Underwood, Richard L. Smith, Bongkeun Song
Mercury and methylmercury stream concentrations in a Coastal Plain watershed: A multi-scale simulation analysis
Mercury is a ubiquitous global environmental toxicant responsible for most US fish advisories. Processes governing mercury concentrations in rivers and streams are not well understood, particularly at multiple spatial scales. We investigate how insights gained from reach-scale mercury data and model simulations can be applied at broader watershed scales using a spatially and temporally explicit wa
Authors
Christopher D. Knightes, Heather E. Golden, Celeste A. Journey, Gary M. Davis, Paul Conrads, Mark Marvin-DiPasquale, Mark E. Brigham, Paul M. Bradley
Thermodynamic properties for arsenic minerals and aqueous species
Quantitative geochemical calculations are not possible without thermodynamic databases and considerable advances in the quantity and quality of these databases have been made since the early days of Lewis and Randall (1923), Latimer (1952), and Rossini et al. (1952). Oelkers et al. (2009) wrote, “The creation of thermodynamic databases may be one of the greatest advances in the field of geochemist
Authors
D. Kirk Nordstrom, Juraj Majzlan, Erich Königsberger
Conflation and aggregation of spatial data improve predictive models for species with limited habitats: a case of the threatened yellow-billed cuckoo in Arizona, USA
Riparian vegetation provides important wildlife habitat in the Southwestern United States, but limited distributions and spatial complexity often leads to inaccurate representation in maps used to guide conservation. We test the use of data conflation and aggregation on multiple vegetation/land-cover maps to improve the accuracy of habitat models for the threatened western yellow-billed cuckoo (Co
Authors
Miguel L. Villarreal, Charles van Riper, Roy E. Petrakis